This blog is about rights issues around access to raw milk. Currently we’re following the ongoing saga of Michael Schmidt, Glencolton Farms and the community of cowshare members and cow lovers that has come together around this issue of raw milk access.
We welcome comments from friends, neighbours and the general public. Feel free to share your views, feedback and opinions, especially on matters related to milk and rights.
For those reading this from somewhere else, Glencolton Farms is located in Durham, Ontario, Canada. Most of the cowshare members are located around Thornhill and Richmond Hill, which are northern suburbs of Toronto (Ontario). Durham is about 2 hours north-west of Toronto.
Note: original material including photos, video and articles published here are copyright by the authors and may not be reproduced elsewhere without permission or credit.
You can write to us at: thebovine at gmx dot com
13 Comments
October 5, 2008 at 8:56 pm
I grew up on raw milk in Germany just hedding over to the nerigboursd farm every second day to get another 3 ltrs.I felt better with the rraw milk compared what we could get in the stores.
How says raw milk makes sick is generously wrong.
November 15, 2008 at 12:43 pm
For me, the “right to know” about food is the priority. “Right to choose” follows from this. See the article about corn (http://www.thestar.com/article/537391) in today’s Toronto Star for a good example of a reporter who puts the spotlight on those parts of the food chain that are not mentioned in product labels or industry “nutrition guides”.
November 15, 2008 at 5:25 pm
Have just found your site, very interesting. My family has two cows (I’m in the UK) and goats and next year we are going to have FAR to much milk for us, would be very interested in finding out some more details from you about cowshares, what they are, how they work, etc.
November 20, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Again we see that big can do anything it wants and the aditude of inspecters and this is what Mike is up agaist–the aditude of inspecers –my blog on the cbc news artical ———-In this article it clearly states–discretion of the inspector– and this is the problem as a person who spent thirty years in the processing business I have seen and been a victim of these civil servants who believe that big companies can do no wrong. It also identifies that some how this and all consumers are to blame and they do not take him seriously until the CBC gets involved. I had the privilege of speaking at the Michael Schmidt press conference at Queens Park on Tuesday and one reporter said that it looks like the government wants to get rid of small business, he is close, it is the civil servants who want to get rid of small business , the politicians turn a blind eye as demonstrated in my case and will in Michaels . If this had been a small manufacturer he would have been charged by now but this is Dole
I am just one vote
February 15, 2009 at 1:10 pm
It is amazing how we as consumers have been “dumbed down” about our foods, thanks to media, monsanto and yours truly…our government.
Very sad.
With many not caring or knowing the environmental sacrifices our health, animals and land has made for conventional grown foods to get to their tables.
The time is now for those of us who do know the truths to talk about these issues within our local communities and educate them on why it is important to support the small organic and natural family farms.
We believe starting at this level is what will make a difference for a better future.
Happy Farming,
Great blog here, we’ll be talking about you!
March 2, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Sure drink Raw milk if you want to but please do not give it to your children. If you have witnessed what these bacteria can do to the intestines and the kidneys of little children… you would maybe think again about pasteurization.
April 3, 2009 at 9:58 am
I love eating Cheese that has been made with RAW MILK. It is more healthy, (something that the NAU doesn’t want for anyone but the corrupt elites of the world),
We can’t even purchase RAW MILK to drink for ourselves. Yet, in contrast, we can go to a doctor and get a vaccination shot, (laced with toxins, mercury, aluminum, dead cells, cancer viruses, formaldehyde, etc… ), and have it completely paid for, (even pushed on us!), by our servant government.
Yes, this is still Canada but not for much longer. It is fading slowly into a Police State which will soon be governed by the European nations if we don’t stand up as Canadians and let the majority of Canadians know what the government really plans for the people.
May 3, 2009 at 6:37 pm
I may have gotten my blogspot incorrect bec. I don’t get to use it very much.
I am a research dietitian and biologist-biochemist. I became allergic to cow’s milk when pregnant. I began drinking pasteurized and then raw goat’s milk. This helped me so much we bought land in the country and got some baby Alpine and Alpine-Nubian cross goats and soon had our own milk supply fed as naturally as possible. Later my father age 80 moved in with us after my mom died. We put him on a diet of organic fruits, vegs and cereals, lamb, poultry, rabbit, and lots of raw goats milk and cultured milk products I made myself.
Dad was very weak when he moved to the Texas hill country, had congestive heart failure, on diuretics, could barely walk over fifty feet, etc. Lots of meds. After six months, his doctor reduced the meds in half. At eight months on raw goat’s milk, his doctors, impressed as all get-out, removed him from all medications. He was getting out and going for several mile walks, helping to bottle raise lambs and milk goats, feeding the chickens, and taking loppers and saws and going out clearing brush and playing with his dogs and cats outdoors daily. He got pretty hard to keep up with. Also we gave him trace minerals and lots of natural vitamins, natural mixed vit. E, etc. He lived to be 85 and died from complications of a community-based pneumonia that both I and my husband and half the town and most of the Texas hill country had. He also went swimming with me in the very cold Frio River in the Texas hills and decided he needed new girlfriends so he could possibly remarry. To give you a better idea of what my dietetic ideas did for him-his dad died at age 58 from health problems and his mom from a heart attack in her early seventies. If we had known about products like Dr. Patrick Flanagan’s activated hydrogen ions and minerals and MAXGXL invented by Dr. Keller, my father might still yet be alive today! Of course, he might also still be alive if the local county attorney and her husband and cronies hadn’t decided they wanted our ranch and farm and would stop at nothing to get it, including fraud, criminal acts against our family, etc. We lived then in what I call the second most crooked county in Texas.
We settled finally with Alpines and Toggenburgs. Goats’ milk has even more healing substances in it than cows’ milk, but both carry an anti-arthritis factor wh/ is destroyed by heat of pasteurization. There are also anti-cancer factors and vitamins destroyed by heat in goats’ and sheeps’ milk. Goat milk is the closest to human milk other than sheep.
If you are poor but would still like to get some goats’ milk by yourself, you can buy a baby dairy buck purebred for $50 or less and then try to find some Spanish or other goats that have udders as big as you can find and cross them with your dairy buck and keep crossing them back to him. You will finally end up with almost purebred milk goats. You could do a similar things with cows, get a baby dairy bull and raise him. You can share milking and cheese-making chores and equipment with a neighbor or friend. And yes, goats house-break and can be taken along on camping trips, walk on leashes and only go potty on the milking stand when they are mad at you-truth! Except when you are training them to be milked. They can also double as pack animals on camping trips as they are usually happy to be where their humans are. You have a God-given right to be in touch with the land and raise your own food and support natural farming practices.
I suggest going also to David Icke’s website and seeing what peaceful activity can do to change a wrongful government. Some Lutheran black women in Liberia, sick of genocide and other rotten gov’t. practices are changing things just by showing up with signs and asking for their human rights. What is really funny about this is Mr. Icke, bless his adorable soul, does not like Christians, yet he is reporting on the positive changes these women are doing to change their nation.
The laws some gov’ts. are submitting people to now are not only anti-Christian, anti-all religions and anti-human, they are just plain anti-life. Some of these laws hurt humans, animals, plants and the entire planet. Of course, we all need to wake up and be counted.
Oh, by the way, you wake up a lot better when you turn off your TV and computer and cover them up or unplug them when you aren’t using them. Cell phone, too.
May 3, 2009 at 7:29 pm
Dear folks,
This is not a comment to anyone else’s comment above, but just a response to your wonderful website.
There is a Bible prophecy ignored by everyone that I have been researching along with my other equine research (independent doctoral research), ignored by Christians, by New Agers, by everyone.
Hosea 2:14-23 and also in Isaiah. This may be in other religions, also, haven’t had time to read it there, yet. The prophecy basically describes a woman going to the wilderness where God speaks to her in a friendly way. Then she begins to sing of past times. Then God makes a covenant with the animals after which mankind is no longer able to wage war. Peace ensues and God, man, the earth, plants and animals are all able to “hear” one another. All is at peace. This is in the authorized King James version and also in the Lamsa version, a direct translation of the Aramaic language which Christ spoke.
This was beginning to happen on our small mission church ranch in Texas. People who visited said the love they felt after passing through our gates was so strong they almost would faint from the feeling of overwhelming love. Love coming from everywhere, the land, the animals, the people. In five months, almost all of our research stallions had been killed by the neighbors by being injected with phenol, arsenic,lead and mercury. All the animals and people on the land were given the same poison. The county government did nothing but cover up for the hate crimes conducted by the neighbors. However, truth has a funny way of making its way back to the surface. You can read about our research with horses, dogs, cats and dolphins on Blogspot at americanequineresearchinstitute. We are a tax-exempt 501.c.3 and will continue to search for the truth of everything as long we draw breath.
All of you humans out there need to keep on searching for the truth of everything, too. It’s the only way we and our world will survive. By the way, thank you Don and Carol Croft for suggesting that everyone ought to try talking with dolphins and whales. I never thought it would lead to my psychopathic neighbors putting poison in our drinking water, but I am still alive and living someplace safer with those of us who survived.
I recently found that a Sioux chief named Black Elk had a near death vision when he was nine years old in the 1800’s. In his vision a great black stallion came to him and sang a song to him about the horses coming from all over the universe to sing and dance a song of joy. The stallion who started me on this line of my research was the great black Arabian stallion Sable Shadow, who initiated contact between himself, the other stallions who performed with me in arenas for Thundering Hooves Ministries, the mares, foals, dogs, cats, other animals at the ranch mission/research facility and dolphins down in the Gulf of Mexico. All the animals began to show greater intelligence, more cooperation with each other and the humans on the property. Things just got better and better until the alcoholic and drug addict neighbors five months later decided to drive the mission out permanently. (We had suffered hate crimes for two years already that just kept getting stepped up when local law enforcement ignored what was happening)
The magnificent and creative, intelligent Sable Shadow who was the leader of all the horses, was one of the first to be killed (murdered, as far as I am concerned) by the neighbors while I was at work as editor of a local paper in central Texas.
The Bible says God restores. All religions I think believe in restoration. I believe in restoration. Canadians can restore their human rights and gov’t. All people in all nations can begin to take action to restore their rights and gov’t. It is done with love and hope and gratitude for the day, not with hate. In fact, as much as we have suffered, I believe that love, hope and peace is the only way we can actually win. We are not fighting against, we are going toward a better day, a healthier planet, a happier life. Yavashua bless you all.
Sister Katy
AmericanEquineResearch
Institute or
Christ Complete Ministries
P.O. Box 2585
Granite Shoals, Texas 78654
americanequine@yahoo.com
May 14, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Well done! It is encouraging that some people in this country can think for themselves and are willing to become part of the process of creating change in government. It is what America is all about.
Please post / email the following link to any U.S. Veterans and their families so they can add their voices to those letting our representatives know we will not stand for NAIS.
http://petition2congress.com/2/1903/veterans-against-nais/
Thanks
June 28, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Hi Richard:
Here is the website for our holistically managed grass-finished beef operation. Hopefully one day you can come for a visit.
Cheers,
Mike
September 21, 2009 at 8:05 am
I lived in the Swedish countryside with my 4 children, they all grew up on raw milk…since 1985. To this day they have a problem drinking “store-milk” as we call it.
I grew up on raw milk. I do fine with raw milk whereas store-milk makes me sick.
October 29, 2009 at 12:54 am
Check http://slowfoodaustralia.com.au/projects/australia/raw-milk-cheese/